The Expert Eye
Episodes
Episode 37: A Conversation with Daile Kaplan
31 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Daile Kaplan is a true champion of photography. As Director of the Photographs Department at Swann Galleries she introduced dedicated sales of vern...
Episode 36: Kaloma
01 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A trip to Istanbul in 2011 revealed several mysteries, including a portrait of a dark-eyed, scantily clad woman whose true identity has been elusive f...
Episode 35: Dogs Behaving Badly
11 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the summer of 2025, Aimee participated in the 30th season of PBS’ beloved program, Antiques Roadshow. As a volunteer appraiser, it’s always exc...
Episode 34: A Conversation with Rick Wester
02 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In my continuing series of conversations with people who have shaped the Photographs market, I move back to focusing on the auction world. I sat dow...
Episode 33: Twist Endings
21 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Ralph Eugene Meatyard’s series of photographs featuring his family in unexpected places and costumes are hard to describe but entirely captivating. ...
Episode 32: Avery on the Log
15 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In 1853, photographer Platt Babbitt made a chilling daguerreotype of a man named Joseph Avery, who had been stuck on a tree branch in the middle of t...
Episode 31: A Conversation with Leland Rice, Part II
16 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In the second half of my conversation with curator, educator, and photographer Leland Rice, he talks about two major exhibitions that he worked on for...
Episode 30: Post-Sale Wrap Up with Aimee and Emily
01 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Despite a raging head cold, Aimee barrels through to give you want you want: a discussion with Emily Bierman that covers the stellar results of the sa...
Episode 29: A Conversation with Denise Bethel, Part II
16 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this long awaited second interview with former Chairman of Sotheby’s Photographs, Denise Bethel, she and Aimee talk about her long career at So...
Episode 28: A Conversation with Leland Rice
26 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This is the first part of a conversation between Aimee Pflieger and Leland Rice on May 19, 2024. Here, he details his first exposure to photography, h...
Episode 27: The Untitled One
11 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How important are names? How important are titles of photographs? In this episode Aimee identifies 3 major ways that things become mistitled and how t...
Episode 26: A Conversation with Susan Kismaric
02 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, Aimee sits down with Susan Kismaric, who started working in the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in 1976 after a ...
Episode 25: Shades of Gray
07 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, Aimee discusses Roy DeCarava’s lyrical photographs with Saul Robbins, who was DeCarava’s studio assistant during graduate schoo...
Episode 24: A Conversation with Denise Bethel, Part I
04 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Denise Bethel joined Swann Galleries in 1980, soon after photographs auctions were inaugurated in New York. After a decade at Swann, she moved to So...
Episode 23: Layer Cake
09 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The layers within this story are many: Director James Cameron drew a picture of a picture and then gave said picture to an actor to use as a prop in a...
Episode 22: A Conversation with Howard Greenberg
13 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Formerly a photographer and founder of The Center for Photography in Woodstock in 1977, Howard Greenberg has been one of a small group of gallerists...
Episode 21: Post-Sale Wrap with Aimee and Emily
18 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Emily Bierman, SVP and Global Head of Sotheby’s Photographs, comes back to chat with Aimee about the spectacular results of the Sotheby’s Photogra...
Episode 20: The Limits of Control: O. Winston Link
19 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
O. Winston Link is the King of Steam Train Photography. His mastery of the medium of photography and artistry in creating night shots is unparalleled....
Episode 19: Carleton Watkins Detective
09 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Cartleton Watkins is considered by many to be the foremost 19th century photographer of the American West. His ‘mammoth plate’ prints can se...
Episode 18: Margaret Bourke-White and the NBC Murals
19 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Margaret Bourke-White was commissioned for what was to be the largest photo-mural in the world for the newly-constructed 30 Rockefeller Plaza. S...
Episode 17: Second Chances
14 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In 1930 three people, Edward Weston, Lincoln Steffens, and Jack Black (not THAT Jack Black) have some life-changing experiences and their stories inte...
Episode 16: Lost and Found Dept.: The One-Man Historical Society
10 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the early 2000s Alan Pflieger, a photographer in Huntington, Indiana (and my dad), acquired a huge archive of negatives from the Rickert Studio, wh...
Episode 15: Post Sale Wrap with Emily and Aimee
22 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Emily Bierman, SVP and Global Head of Sotheby’s Photographs, chats with Aimee about the April 13, 2022 Photographs auction. Covered: estimate ...
Episode 14: A Talk with Lee Marks
18 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Lee Marks, a photography dealer and consultant, heads Lee Marks Fine Art, established in New York City in 1981 and now located in Shelbyville, Indiana...
Episode 13: The Witch Dance
11 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In 1914, Mary Wigman created a dance that would shatter the rules about what dance was supposed to look like. A trio of images by Charlotte Rudo...
Episode 12: Ansel Adams Detective
10 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode Aimee gives you the secret five-step process for looking at Ansel Adams prints, providing lots of detail on Adams’ signature (and un...
Episode 11: Deborah Bell, Part II
03 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the second half of my interview with Deborah Bell, we talk about Deborah's experiences as a private dealer, auction house specialist, gallery owner...
Episode 10: Deborah Bell, Part I
03 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After 13 years as a private dealer, Deborah Bell opened her first public gallery at 511 West 25th Street in Chelsea and remained there for 10 years (2...
Episode 9: If You Could Read My Mind, Love
23 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
What if you could send from your brain straight to a camera? In the 1960s, a man named Ted Serios and a psychiatrist named Dr. Jule Eisenbud set...
Episode 8: Diane Arbus, Steven Shainburg, and 'Fur.'
10 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, Steven Shainberg, director of 'Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus' joins me to discuss hero worship, hairy actors, and make-be...
Episode 7: Diane Arbus and the Monster Club
19 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, I tell the story of how I got to research a very rare photograph by Diane Arbus that she took while on assignment for a magazine call...
Episode 6: The Devil's Paradise
21 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
A German Photographer named Albert Frisch was responsible for some of the first photographs taken in the Upper Amazon. Among those images are on...
Episode 5: The Monkey On Her Back
23 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In 1939, LIFE photojournalist Hansel Mieth took a photograph that would haunt her for the rest of her life. That photograph was … of a monkey....
Episode 4: Frozen in Time
09 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
At the height of Polar Mania, three Swedish explorers went on the search for the North Pole by hot air balloon. This episode tells the story of what h...
Episode 3: The New Woman
25 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Aimee visits an intriguing exhibition at The Met and realizes that it is coincidentally connected to a print she catalogued for an upcoming auction by...
Episode 2: Print Class/Bill Brandt
20 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
A 1933 image of rooftops by influential British photographer Bill Brandt comes across Aimee’s desk, and she tries to get to the bottom of how Brandt...
Episode 1: Inferno Crisis
16 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
A photographic discovery by astronomer Sir John Herschel inadvertently influences the mad experimentation of playwright August Strindberg, leading to ...